If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Threaded View

Geoffrey B. Small

I would like to kick of a discussion on a designer who has been quietly working away, doing his own thing, in a very cool way, since the 80’s. He was one of, if not the first to do recycled, and although Margiela also did it very well, I believe that Geoffrey did it in a more honest way. He has been making environmentally concessions clothing since way before it was fashionable and when designers like Yohji and Comme were expanding their production he was shrinking his, so that he had more control over it. He is not just a designer, but a tailor, a pattern cutter and machinist, so he really does understand and have control over the every detail of his clothing. He even works with a local fabric weaver to produce just what he needs for each piece. I understand that the there are many who do this now, but in combination with the fact that he personally oversees and works on pretty much every garment which he produces, I think that this makes him pretty special.

You may not be into Geoffrey B. Smalls design because, like Poell and Harnden, he designs from his own special place which is not really influenced by the fashion world. He is far more interested in history and socio-political issues, and how they affect the way we cloth ourselves. When I first saw his work, it scared the shit out of me! But after speaking to him in great depth, I began to understand his attention to rapidly disappearing values and to the details which are becoming less and less important in modern clothing, and the journey which had brought him to this place from where he produces his art. To me this involvement is very important.

Although seen in a very different light he has a lot in common with Altieri and did indeed showed with him in Paris in the very early days of Carpe Diem. Although he never exploded onto the scene, creating the impact that Altieri did, he has been working in a similar way for much longer and has probably, in a far more indirect way, had an equal impact on the way that the likes of Grandma, Luca, and this whole wave of new-school craftspeople who have emerged in the wake of Carpe Diem.

Ps. when I can post images I will let you see some of my collection of his work.

"I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying." — Oscar Wilde